Students show pride in true colours

Pride Week celebrations at Bunbury Senior High School attracted a high profile guest on Friday.

The US consul general to Western Australia, Cynthia Griffin, visited the school to meet students behind the celebrations.

Ms Griffin made the trip from Perth as a show of support for the school’s work in supporting students of diverse sexualities.

Ms Griffin said as an American she was “very much anti-homophobic and anti-transphobic”.

“I do a lot of outreach to a lot of schools in the State,” she said.

“I’m coming here in support of what the school is doing.

“When I go to a school I just go to speak to the young people and encourage them to be who they are and pursue excellence.”

For the past three and a half years the school has run Uniting Care West’s True Colours Safer Schools program.

School psychologist Nina Mastrantonio said she had noticed an increase in the number of students seeking support since the program began.

She said having Ms Griffin visit showed the students what they had to say and how they felt was important.

The school was decorated with colourful yarn bombing for Pride Week and students shared their experiences and information about where to seek help with other students.

“I do a lot of outreach to a lot of schools in the State” — Cynthia Griffin, US consul general to WA

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